


it's gonna be fine

by girlsonthetv



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, Fluff, Haircuts, Ingrid's Coping, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-21
Updated: 2020-03-21
Packaged: 2021-02-28 18:07:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,910
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23251426
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/girlsonthetv/pseuds/girlsonthetv
Summary: If Ingrid lived in one of the knight's tales she loved so much, the universe would have appreciated the symbolism of her hacking off her hair with a knife. Unfortunately, the universe is not so kind - but Hilda is.
Relationships: Ingrid Brandl Galatea/Hilda Valentine Goneril
Comments: 1
Kudos: 30





	it's gonna be fine

Ingrid looked into the waters of the fishing pond, took a moment to observe her reflection there. She touched a finger to her face in the water and watched the image dissolve. She saw her long, golden, _ladylike_ hair, and felt cold anger well within her chest. There was an abandoned knife on the dock, an ugly serrated thing meant to gut fish. She took it up and began to methodically saw her hair off, handful by erratic handful. 

Her father hadn’t wanted her to continue to fight the Empire. Their house was weak as it was, he wheedled as she packed the most important of her things. Stay here, my girl. Obey the Empire and we may find prosperity yet. He had stroked her hair, then, to try and calm her. It was her mother’s hair, Ingrid’s best feature, the savior of her plain face and unremarkable figure. Boys always remarked on its length, how much time she must put in taking care of it. She didn’t have time for such things anymore, even if she’d been interested in them to start with. 

Locks of hair fall around her like she’s a tree shedding leaves in preparation for a long, cold winter. Cold air hits the back of her exposed neck, and she shivers. _Look what you’ve done,_ a reproachful voice in the back of her head that sounds a little like her father and a little like her mother and a little like herself said, and a hysterical laugh clawed itself free of her. Her hair was as short as a boy’s, now, with no bangs to cover her forehead. She’d grown bangs in the first place to cover up zits, but now there weren’t any blemishes to be found. She’d grown up in the five years since the war started, without even noticing. 

She stared into the depths of the icy water, her eyes widening as she took herself in. It would be obvious to anyone who looked at her that her new style was brought on by turbulent emotion amplified by the late hour and seeing all of her school friends again. Her hair resembled a scarecrow’s, cropped short with no regard for style, or even keeping all the strands roughly the same length. 

“Okay, let’s be calm… “ Ingrid murmured frantically. She held the knife up tentatively to her hair, trying to gauge in her shifting reflection how much it would take to even her hair back out. Was it even wise to try to cut anymore? She knew nothing about cutting hair. She would be bald at this rate. 

“Ingrid? You okay?” A familiar, bubbly voice, with the inflection of someone trying to coax a wild animal. 

Ingrid turns, still holding the knife, and Hilda takes a step back instinctively. Ingrid self-consciously puts the knife down, calls on old etiquette lessons about good posture being one’s best shield and straightens her back. “I’m… fine. I just… “ Her shoulders sag. “I don’t know.” 

Hilda stifles a smirk. “Are you going to tell me what the story is with your hair?” 

Ingrid’s cheeks redden. “I was going for a walk, and I saw my reflection in the pond, and I didn’t like what I saw. So, I tried to change it.” Ingrid looks down at her lap. “It didn’t go as well as it does in books.” 

“Like in _The Moon Knight’s Tale_ , when she cuts her hair off all in one stroke with her sword? Because she wanted to be a knight?” Ingrid gathers the courage to look up, and Hilda’s smile is utterly sincere. _She isn’t mocking me._ Stunned into silence, Ingrid could only nod. 

“That’s a good book. I read it while I was away fighting. It made me less… well, I guess homesick isn’t the right word. It made me feel better.” Hilda drops to her knees in front of Ingrid, and brushes a couple bits of hair off of the top of her cheek. Ingrid’s heart doesn’t want to stop racing. “The Moon Knight reminded me of you. Loyal and brave and beautiful… Do you want to go up to my room?” 

Ingrid blinks dumbly. Hilda had switched topics so quickly that she almost missed her calling her beautiful - almost. “For what? I mean, why?”

“I’ve got some scissors up there more suited for hair than that thing.” Hilda nods to the boning knife. “And I’ve been working on some barrettes that would match your eyes just perfectly.” Hilda offers her hand. After a second’s pause, Ingrid takes it, still a little breathless. Swinging their hands and humming a little tune to herself, Hilda leads Ingrid up to her room. 

Hilda is already completely moved in, Ingrid notes with more than a little awe. Granted, it isn’t as if any of them packed their whole wardrobes, or all of their earthly possessions, but it feels like Hilda has been living there for months, and not a few days. Perhaps it’s the sweet, fruity smell of her perfume, which has embedded itself in the walls and the floor. Ingrid subconsciously breathes in deep - notes of peaches, lilies, roses, all combined with the smells of craft glue and pastries and hair tonic to make a smell that’s unmistakably Hilda. Ingrid smiles. 

“What are you grinning for?” Hilda sounds a little self-conscious, though why is anyone’s guess. 

“I missed you, Hilda. That’s all.” Ingrid squeezes Hilda’s hand before Hilda lets go and sits at her desk, already scattered with various bits and bobs that she’s planning on assembling into darling little treasures. Ingrid spies pressed flowers, silky ribbons, small shiny crystals, strands of lace, and other things she can’t identify. 

“Awww, I missed you too, Ingrid.” Hilda is so very like Claude, Ingrid thinks as Hilda works busily, always couching her emotions in irony. 

“How is Claude?” Ingrid asks. Hilda briefly pauses in her work before continuing. 

“He’s happy. Well - not happy, but doing well. He’s good at all that leader-ly stuff.” Hilda plucks a few strands of green ribbon from a pile of different colors. “Keeping the Alliance neutral so the Empire doesn’t spy weakness and swoop in isn’t a job just anybody can do. You can sit on my bed, by the way.” 

Ingrid sat down, suddenly aware that she’d been standing up the whole time. “Why didn’t you stay by his side? Why did you come back? Not that I’m upset, mind.” Ingrid added hastily. 

Hilda was silent for a minute, and Ingrid feared that she’d offended her until she said, “I wanted to see all my school friends, Ingrid, why else?” There was a forced cheeriness in her tone that reminded Ingrid of Sylvain, and so she did what she did with Sylvain and let the conversation drop. 

Silence settled over the room, with the soft snipping of one of Hilda’s many small pairs of scissors the only thing breaking it. Then Hilda began to hum a tune, a love song that was popular in their school days, as she worked, and Ingrid tentatively joined in, singing along with Hilda once they reached the chorus. _If I told you that you rock my world, I want you around me…_

 _“Would you let me call you my girl… “_ Hilda crooned softly as she placed tiny dots of glue with all the care and precision of a doctor stitching a wound. Was it Ingrid’s imagination, or was there something in the air that night? No one can say, but Hilda’s singing sounded especially lovely to Ingrid that evening; when it was just the two of them in Hilda’s bright, warm room. 

Hilda giggled happily as they finished the chorus, and Ingrid sighed like she’d just finished a large and satisfying meal. “O-kay, now I’ll fix up your hair while the glue is drying.” She picked up another pair of scissors and gave them a few experimental snips. “Come sit in the chair. What, you’re not getting cold feet now, are you?” Hilda said when Ingrid hesitated. 

Ingrid sat down in the chair Hilda had occupied, and Hilda draped hand towels around her neck. “Don’t fidget too much, or they’ll come tumbling down and you’ll get hair all down your back.” 

“Yes, ma’am.” Ingrid said, adjusting one of the towels. Hilda giggled again, even though it wasn’t especially funny, and got to work. 

Ingrid had gotten her hair cut before, many times. Even hair kept long required routine maintenance to keep the ends from fraying and splitting. Never before had she realized just how _close_ to her the person cutting her hair was. She closed her eyes, swallowed hard, focused on the sharp sound of Hilda’s scissors instead of the feel of her breath warm against the back of her neck. She must be overtired. 

Time passed. Hilda made a few final snips, then held up a mirror to show Ingrid her work. “Is this good, or do you want it a little shorter in the back?” 

Ingrid opened her eyes and couldn’t help a soft gasp. “See? I told you I could fix it. Don’t you look so handsome?” 

“... I… I look like a knight.” Ingrid said, grinning. Hilda smiled.

“You’ve always looked like a knight, Ingrid. No haircut I gave you would change that. Ahem - now, for the finishing touch!” She spun around to pick something up off of her desk, but not before Ingrid caught a glimpse of red in Hilda’s cheeks. “Can you hold the mirror for a sec?”

Ingrid obliged. Hilda tucked a little triangle of lace trailing green ribbon on each side of her head. “Since you’re always flying, I thought it would be cute if it looked kind of like a kite. See, here’s the body,” Hilda’s hand on her cheek, her finger pointing it out, “and here’s the tether.”

“They kind of look like cat ears, too.” Ingrid said as she examined her new accessories. 

Hilda shut her mouth, blushing deep. “Do you not like them?” 

“No, they’re beautiful. The green ribbon matches my eyes.” Ingrid put down the mirror and looked up at Hilda. “Thank you, Hilda.” 

Hilda giggled. “Don’t mention it.” 

Silence stretched, stretched, _stretched_ until neither could bear it, until Ingrid got up and Hilda simultaneously offered her hand for Ingrid to take. “Do you want me to walk you to your room?” 

“I’ll be alright. Thank you, though.” The minute the words left her mouth Ingrid knew it was the wrong answer. Hilda could hide her emotions with the best of them, but even Ingrid could spot the disappointment in her look before she turned away. Ingrid tried not to sigh too audibly.

As she stood in the doorway, she turned back. “Hilda?” 

“Yes?” Hilda looked up, all her perkiness returned; it seemed like nothing had ever been wrong, but Ingrid wasn’t fooled. 

“Do you… would you like to take tea with me sometime soon?” She’d never asked anyone on a date before. She hoped this was the proper protocol. 

Hilda smiled, giggled, tossed her hair over her shoulder. “I would love to, Ingrid. Have a good night.” 

“You too.” Ingrid closed the door after a smile and a wave, then let herself have a proper Faerghan self-deprecating sigh. 

She reached up to touch the ends of her much, much shorter hair. Her head and heart felt so much lighter as she began to walk back towards her room and plan what cakes she would bring to her and Hilda’s tea party.

**Author's Note:**

> may i offer you all some pre-hilgrid fluff in these trying times
> 
> title from 'short hair' by aoa


End file.
